There was something in the air. I can say that.
I knew something was about to happen.
I would have no other way to describe it other than I could feel something coming, like a sense of impending news, crucial and hard, and yet there was an understanding—like a strange calmness that this is life and these are the rules of our engagement.

I was told about another death last night. The news hit home.
However, this is par for the course, and these are the rules of the game.
No one knows the hour or the day is what I was told.
And life?

I wat this more than before. Then again. I am not sure who I was before.
That is of course, if there was such a thing as before.
But there always is. Isn’t there?
There is always a time before now; and now is the time.
Now is the time when my eyes are opened enough that I can see what I have endured, what I have missed, and what I have squandered.
I am not so different from the Prodigal Son; only, I have yet to return and I have yet to be forgiven by my Father.

I want more. I want more than before but to be clear; I’ve always wanted this, even before I found myself here, which is where I am, and waiting for the prosecution to rest their case

It is no different to assume a loss than it is to lose in the physical sense. Either way, the mind sees what the mind sees; whereas my time has been confined to this small place and yet, there is a great big world outside and around me.
The receptors in the mind do not know the difference between fantasy and reality, whereas I can dream and picture myself or imagine my losses, and whether my thoughts are reality or fiction, the results of my emotions are the same.

The rain fell hard last night. I could hear the raindrops hit the rooftop which kept me awake for a while. And so, I laid back and looked up at the ceiling.
I thought about the hours and the days and even the minutes I spent elsewhere, looking at life with all too much confidence that nothing is threatened because tomorrow would always be there, —until it wasn’t.
This is how things go when we are young.
We never seem to think that age is real until it creeps up on us.
Age is something that happens to old people.
And one day, we turn around to realize that decades have escaped without leaving a sign and much of our dreams have all gone deferred.

“Are you back again?”
I suppose so.
“Did they give you anything yet?
I’m not sure. But the voices are louder this time.
“What about the smell?
Of the people you mean?
“That’s when you know it’s real.”

I don’t think I know if anything is real
(anymore)

I heard the cages banging last night. There was a threat of prisoners looking to riot, which is nothing more than another day here, alive, and living with the beasts.

In all fairness, I have to admit to the truth. And the truth is I am afraid. The truth is I am afraid of everyone. And I’ve always been afraid.
I was afraid to care.
I’ve been afraid to be the fool or afraid to be hurt and I have always been afraid to be weak or soft and used.

I was thinking about the way we speak with each other. I was thinking about the words we use and their value to us.
Or more to the point, I was about how we invest in the words we say or hear.
Then I started to think about our selective hearing. Or maybe it would be better for me to tick to the plan and explain about my own selective hearing.

I was thinking about the most important and meaningful three words in our English language
I was thinking about words like, I love you.
Or how about the words, I need you

Or what does it mean to you when someone says, “You mean the world to me!”
What does any of these words mean when someone says these things and yet, we struggle to feel them or believe their words are true.

There was snow over the weekend in Purgatory. There wasn’t much. But there was enough to coat the ground and keep the nighttime from being as dark.
Alone above, the moon took on the bluish hint and the holiday lights made the season feel more festive for a while.
These things are bitter sweet for me.

I don’t mind the snow. I don’t mind the cold.
No, really.
I don’t mind these things at all.

I have these dreams, which are not dreams at all. They are more like pictures and memories of times, long ago, or back when I was old enough to understand but to young to know that I had the right to question the life in front of me.
I am sick now, late in some regards, and older, achy, and unforgivably defiant against the ideas that yes, “this is it!” and this is as good as it gets.

No. I refuse this.
I know there has to be more.

There are memories I have. I swear.
I was young once. Wild too, and I was crazy in the best ways possible.
I was eager and afraid.
And I remember.
I remember the ideas and the thoughts and the cravings which came over me like a wave as it falls across the shore.

I remember some of my drives, long ago.
I remember driving over the 59^th Street Bridge.
The Big City. And there she was.
New York, New York.
She is bright like a dream and complete with every urge or desire.
She is complete with every idea or every kink or fetish.

And hey, don’t judge.
Or don’t knock it, until you try it.
You never know.